Driveline founder Kyle Boddy leaves Red Sox for other pro baseball jobs

Driveline founder Kyle Boddy recently left the Red Sox to pursue other opportunities in professional baseball, he told the Globe on Wednesday.

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Boddy, who had been a special advisor to chief baseball officer Craig Breslow since 2024, said a pair of other roles conflicted with his Sox work.

“If not for that, I’d stay with the org, but had to make a tough choice is all,” Boddy said via text. “Still very close with all the guys and hope for the best for the organization.”

Boddy declined to specify his other jobs but noted that he worked for the Red Sox and someone else last year, too. When he and Breslow realized last month that “I can’t do both things simultaneously unfortunately due to rules and regulations,” he opted to leave the Sox, with whom his work had become “very part time.”

On social media, Boddy lists himself as a special advisor for MLB and Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball.

In Breslow’s first offseason as the Red Sox’ head of baseball operations, Boddy was among his biggest hires, brought aboard to help the organization beef up its pitching research and development — a major priority for Breslow. After their first season together, Boddy also served as the team’s interim director of baseball sciences.

Boddy characterized his involvement with the Red Sox as reduced in every year since his first. He officially left about a month ago.

“Just the natural progress of things,” he said.

Boddy established Driveline, a data-driven player development organization based outside Seattle, in 2008. Since then, the company has built significant influence in the industry, on both players and clubs, including the Red Sox. He previously was the Reds’ director of pitching during the 2020-21 seasons.

Among the many Driveline alumni hired by the Sox in recent years are hitting coaches John Soteropulos and Collin Hetzler and major league pitching strategist Devin Rose.

The Red Sox were supposed to face Blue Jays righthander Max Scherzer, a virtual lock for the Hall of Fame, on Wednesday. But he was scratched — and placed on the injured list — because of back spasms, another in a long series of injuries that have sidelined him in recent years.

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Scherzer, who turns 42 next month, has made only a half-dozen starts this year. Last week he returned from a six-week absence induced primarily by a forearm issue.

“I’m frustrated,” Scherzer told reporters. “I wanted to get in that rhythm. I wanted to be out there. My arm feels like it’s in a really great spot right now, but I can’t go.”

In his stead, Toronto rolled with a bullpen game, beginning with righthander Braydon Fisher. Righthander Chad Dallas was called up from Triple-A to take Scherzer’s roster spot.

As Red Sox decision-makers mull their options in the lead-up to the Aug. 3 trade deadline — sell off pieces if it keeps going like this, maybe add if the team figures it out — the task for those in the clubhouse is to keep their head on straight.

The players “are pretty good at that,” said interim manager Chad Tracy.

“There’s enough knowledge that some [rumors] can be true. There’s a lot of things that are noise that maybe aren’t true. It gets louder when you get to that period of time,” Tracy said. “Probably 75 percent of the things or more that you hear are maybe not true, so it’s not worth getting caught up in — outside of the realization that they know that we got to get going or things like that can happen [and players will be traded].”

Aroldis Chapman’s sore left hamstring still is bothering him, Tracy said, some three weeks or so since it first popped up.

Chapman also has pitched just three times in 28 days. That largely is a product of so few save opportunities.

“We’re getting better. I’m sure it’s moderately there, but improving a lot,” Tracy said. “[With a small lead] we use him in the ninth or whatever. If we’re not there in the ninth, he gets to rest and we get it right. But he’s improving quite a bit.”

In his third rehab outing, Patrick Sandoval struck out four and walked one in three-plus innings for Double-A Portland. The only he hit allowed was a home run to the only batter he faced in the fourth. He threw 44 pitches (27 strikes) . . . Romy Gonzalez (left shoulder surgery) was in Portland’s lineup for a second day in a row, and went 0 for 3 as as the designated hitter after playing second base Tuesday. “Came out of it feeling physically good,” Tracy said of the first game. “So I’d say it was a good first step” . . . Before the game, musicians from the Boston Pops performed in shallow center field for John WilliamsNight.

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